May Death Set Us Free
by Jenksjinx
Summary: Post Season 8 Jonerys. Jon had a great burden thrust upon him. How could he reconcile who he was with who he was meant to be? But he must do what he can to serve. Daenerys woke up alone and afraid in a cold dark cave. After what she'd done to King's Landing she shouldn't be alive. But what if she had a greater purpose in life after death.
1. Chapter 1

He stared at the brazier before him, the flames lashing against the grates. Her voice fresh upon his ear with the words that would haunt him for the rest of his days.

I knew you would betray me.

He could still feel the warm dribble of blood that his fingers found at the crease of her lips. His arms still held the full weight of her crumbling beneath him at her last breaths. Her vacant eyes darkening as the fire inside her died. An Oathbreaker. A Queenslayer. A Kinslayer. Whether this would work or not, could she ever forgive his betrayal?

"Stare long enough into the flames, Your Grace, and the Lord of Light will give you the answers you seek."

Startled by the voice breaking the silence in his small cabin, he stood in a haste, his chair scraping against the wood floor and his hand flexing over the hilt at his waist. Recognition stilled his hands as his breath slowly evened out. Kinvara. The Red Priestess. He beckoned her to enter.

"Forgive me my lady, I was lost in thought." He gestured for her to take a seat beside the fire.

"There is no need for apology, Your Grace, I'm sure there is much to think on."

"I am not a king," the words sharp, leaving no room for disagreement. But unlike Melisandre, Kinvara held an assurance that cut at his resolute stance.

"Perhaps, not of these realms. But you have been chosen. And those chosen must serve."

"Valar Dohaeris." He remembered the phrase in High Valyrian that the Unsullied would shout in response to their queen's Valar Morghulisbefore formation drills on Dragonstone. One of the nights that they spent wrapped in each other's arms on the ship to Winterfell, he had asked her what the exchange meant.

'All men must die, Jon Snow,' she said as her fingertips traced the prominent scars on his chest as they laid naked facing each other in her bed. She placed a lingering kiss on his lips and drew away taking his breath with her. 'And all men must serve.'

The fool in him could only bite his lower lip and stare at her in awe. The silver haired queen who'd chosen to love his poor, jagged heart and who had set his soul afire. He cupped her face in his hand and brought her near taking her lips into his. He could still taste the salt and tart of her on his tongue. Surely, he didn't deserve the love she was offering but he made a promise that everyday he would earn it. With a hungry grunt he pulled away and smiled into her eyes. While he would gladly take her again, a part of him craved nothing more than to learn more about this otherworldly woman.

'Why not say it the other way around? Service comes before death. In death, there is nothing and no one to serve.' He knew this to be true. Death was empty and lonely.

He could tell she knew where his mind had drifted. Her hand stopped just above his heart. 'Then tell me, Jon Snow, if there is no service in death, how are you here? You died and then you rose. You came back to fight for the living. You made that sacrifice.'

'We've made a sacrifice, Dany. We're both alive and we're fighting together.' His finger tucked a strand of her loose hair behind her ear.

'Together?' She exhaled deeply. 'Before you, I felt so alone in this world. Coming to Westeros was supposed to feel like coming home. But at best, I felt like a stranger, at worst, a foreign conqueror with only a name.' A sound near to a laugh escaped her but it was one of the saddest sounds he'd ever heard. 'That is, until I met you.' His heart sang as his eyes found the truth in hers. 'And now I can't help but think that it's me and you against an evil this world hasn't seen in ages. I am grateful to give my life to that purpose. You are alive, Jon. There is no greater service than what you've given since you died'

Her eyes pleaded with him to trust in her words and he couldn't deny her. 'Aye, My Queen."

He claimed every inch of her skin that night and he had never felt more alive than in that moment.

But, their service wasn't over yet. "Are you sure he heads for Eastwatch?"

"Yes. The fire that runs through his blood will lead him there. And there, you will find your queen." The broad smile that illuminated Kinvara's face was confident though until she was in his arms once more, the question would linger in his mind.

He sunk deeper into his seat, his eyes retreating to the fire hoping their boat could catch favorable winds. If so, they'd make landfall in two days, another four to get to the cave. And then? What if it doesn't work?

"Raise the dragon, for his reign will bring the reckoning. Upon your ashes, he shall rise." Pulled from his thoughts, he sought her eyes in question. Those were the words written on the burnt scroll in Lord Varys' chambers. "You don't need to believe in the Lord for his will to be met. Many have been claimed by the fire so that you could fulfill your destiny. Bringing Daenerys Targaryen back to this world is a part of that destiny."

A scoff escaped him. Destiny, fate, prophecy. Words that until recently meant nothing to him. All because one all-knowing being wanted to control the world and he and Dany had drawn the short straws to stop him.

'But you, Lord Snow, you will be fighting their wars forever.' The last words spoken by Thorne were those of a cursed fate.

"You told me on Dragonstone that she had to die. That I had to be the one to do it. Why? Why couldn't it just be me, why couldn't I tell her?"

"I'm afraid the Queen was compromised. It had to be this way, as is the Lord's will. He will bring her back and then you'll both be liberated from the Three-Eyed Ravens hold."

"And after? If everyone is 'compromised', how do we build an army that we can trust? How can we possibly keep our plans from him?" He could feel the fire in him burning. How were they expected to win a war when the numbers were stacked against them?

"Your Grace, there is only one way that has ever worked. It took time and the sacrifice was great." Of course it wouldn't be easy.

"What sacrifice could your Lord want from us?" He stood and paced in front of the flame. His hand running down his face and around his beard.

"There has been only one other that has been able to amass a great army and threaten the rule of the greenseer. You, yourself, have faced him thrice before." He turned toward her and shook his head slowly in disbelief. There's no way. "He was defeated. But he was only one. Now there will be two. And you will succeed where he failed."

"No. No. I won't do it." His voice was raised higher than its ever been. His face twisted in disgust. "He murdered innocents. He stole babies and raised them into, into soldiers. He..."

"...was the only one stopping Bran Stark, and the one before him, from enslaving the world." She stood before him. Her eyes level with his. The bright red necklace around her throat glowed in the fires light. "The cost is great. It will take the lives of many. It will take hundreds, if not thousands of years. But it will save this world. There must be a balance and this is the only way."

"So we will be evil. We will be murderers. We will do our own enslaving." He thought of what Dany would think. The irony of her entire life working towards breaking chains culminating in becoming a slave master.

"It is not an easy life. Being a King never is. You will, however, get to choose how you rule your people, how you form your society. But the formation must be done."

He held his head down with his fists clenched at his sides. He couldn't look at her anymore. He couldn't breath the same air as her anymore. He felt dirty and used. "I'd like to be alone."

"As you wish, Your Grace." She bowed low and purposefully before walking toward the the door. "You'll never be the hero of this story Jon Snow. And Daenerys Targaryen will never be the hero queen flying in on her dragon. They'll never know that you've saved the world. But you will save it."

With that, she took her leave and he was left standing in the shadows of his cabin.

He would take the entire journey north resigning himself to what would come to pass. He thought of Ned Stark and what he would think of his son. Would he be ashamed of who he would become? And Rhaegar and Lyanna? Is this what they wanted their baby boy to be? It didn't matter anymore. They were all dead. And their hopes and dreams with them.

He placed her naked on the hard rock as Kinvara had instructed. She was still as beautiful as the day he first saw her. Though now her face was haunted. Her skin was translucent and her lips were blue. And at the center of her chest was a deep knife wound, the one he'd given her. It was covered in ruby red droplets hardened in the cold. He bent over her and placed his lips near her ear. "Please forgive me," he whispered desperately before placing a chaste kiss on her lips.

After Kinvara said her words all he could do was wait. She'd said they'd do defeat the evil together and he hoped she'd remember her promise.


	2. Chapter 2

It had been cold for so long. Dark for even longer. And yet she didn't feeldead. But she must be. She had to be. She deserved to be.

And yet she felt. Her body laid prostrate upon a slab. A rock slab, hard and frigid. Her eyes blinked, yet the darkness remained. Night. Her eyes adjusted, as best they could, to the abyss that surrounded her. Everywhere in her peripheral she could make out the jutting silhouettes of black rock wall. She breathed, short raspy breaths, yes, but it was air that filled her lungs. Fresh and cleansing. And the sound...harsh, rushing, torrential. Water? A storm? Honing in, she could hear the droplets, the puddles forming. The echo in the emptiness.

She braced herself for the pain that would come from raising herself up. Surely, the strain would hurt. Her hand drifted to her chest, just above her heart. The crusted blood turned to dust beneath her fingertips as she delved into the crude wound. No pain. No sensation at all. She didn't understand and yet she sought to. She raised herself and dropped her feet to the floor. An icy tremor found its way from her toes to her hair. She had never been this cold before. She was a dragon and yet her fire had extinguished.

She stood and wrapped her arms around her cold, naked body. Though she made no warmth.

She stayed close to the jagged wall, edging ever closer toward the roar of the water. Somehow she felt she was at home, and the only home she knew was Dragonstone. That must be this place.

As she rounded a corner, wind whipped furiously at her unbraided hair while a freezing mist sprayed her shivering body. Just ahead a glittering sheet of water fell from the sky and blocked the entrance to wherever she was.

A shallow orange glow danced beyond the water and a pale shadow shifted beyond that. The fire beckoned her closer and the cruel temptation to curl into its embers drew dangerous memories. No. The cold darkness was where she belonged.

And yet.

She found herself drawn into the curtain of water. Drawn to the flame. Drawn to the shadow.

Feeding her impulse, she closed her eyes and stepped forward breaking the water's plane, leaving her tomb behind. The water engulfed her, spilling down her sloped nose and past her steeled shoulders; dipping through the scarred flesh of her chest and over the swell of her womb.

She took a deep breath as she passed through to the other side. Steady, calloused hands helped guide her forward, leading her out of the pool and closer to the fire. The sudden warmth of furs surrounded her while heavy arms stroked down her sides freeing her from the biting cold.

Opening her eyes as if for the first time. She saw that the shifting shadow was no shadow at all. It was the man who gave her the wound within her heart, in every way her heart could be wounded. Drawing back from his hold, something akin to fear slipped over her. But what more can one fear after death.

"Dany." It was him. The ragged, begging voice. The name only he could call her.

"No." The word so simple tumbled from her lips as a whisper.

"You'll not understand it unless I explain it to you. If you don't like what you hear you're free to go. I swear it." His hands raised showing they were empty.

She didn't move to agree but she didn't move to disagree. What could he say? Nothing. It was done.

He took her silence as acceptance and spoke on, his voice low and steady. "We were used, you and I. Pawns in a game started before we were born. Not by prophecies or people. Not by fate. Not by choice. By one being." He bid her sit, offering her a hand and a dry spot nearer the fire. She refused his hand but sat all the same. His head nodded in acceptance as he continued on.

"The throne was never yours or mine to have. It wasn't meant for us. We were simply a means to an end. Do you remember what you felt when you were atop Drogon? Just before...before it happened?"

"Burn them all." The words were as clear as the night sky in the Red Waste. She looked into the glowing light before her, replaying the moment over again as if it had just happened. "A voice that wasn't my own, intruding in my thoughts. It said 'burn them all'. I was at war in my own body. I couldn't hear, I couldn't see, I couldn't think except for what the voice commanded. And so I did. I went mad and killed all of this innocent people."

"No. It wasn't you." His voice filled with conviction.

"Wasn't it?" Tears pricked her eyes and she swallowed any excuses. All her life she thought to keep the madness at bay, and yet when it really mattered, she'd failed. Her coin had always landed on madness but she refused to see it.

"It wasn't. It was Bran."

"What?" Had she heard correctly.

"Bran. The Three Eyed Raven. They're one and the same."

"Your brother?" He nodded. "But how?"

"The Three Eyed Raven is as he says. He knows everything. He keeps the history of the world. But he's also shaping that history and with it, the future. He needed us, Fire and Ice, to defeat his only true adversary. The only being capable of keeping his...powers in check."

"The Night King." The pieces were falling into place.

"Aye. We did something that has never been done. As long as there's been a Three Eyed Raven, there's been a Night King to counter his ambition. And now without him..."

"His powers are limitless." He nodded again, letting his head hang in shame.

"He, Bran, sits the throne in King's Landing."

"Is it so wrong? To have a knowing being lead the people...to save them from themselves before they can cause harm?"

"He's taken away their will. They're not free from harm. They're not free at all. They're slaves in his world that he's created." Anger laced his voice as a growl bellowed from deep within.

"You said they."

"I did." He eyed her cautiously.

"Not us."

"No. Not us." She squinted her eyes at him trying to find the truth that he wanted her to seek.

"There's something different about us." She stood then. Clutching the furs closer to her. Pacing around the fire. Attempting to sort through the cloud of knowledge. If I hadn't died, perhaps I could thing clearer. Her eyes opened wide and as her brows found her hairline.

"We died."

"We did." A conspiratorial smile spread across his face.

"He manipulated the two of us into playing his game. Humans fighting his wars for him. But after it was over, after we won, I was the one the coin landed on, because you had already died. He could command you no more so than he could the Night King himself. It had to be me. And you..." She eyed him with a mix of anger and wonder. "You killed me...knowing you'd free me. But how...how did you bring me back?"

She didn't know when he'd stood and gotten so close to her. She could see the haze from the warmth of his breath just between them.

"The same way I came back. The Lord of Light."

"But how? How did you know all of this? Why did you keep it to yourself?"

"I didn't have a choice. I couldn't risk saying anything out loud. He sees all, but he can't see into my mind. I started figuring it out before we left Winterfell. They were all so oblivious to the sacrifices that you made. Everyone. I mean I could understand the hesitation from the lords and maybe the small folk might've still been fearful of Drogon and Rhaegal. But my sisters?" He let out a long breath. "Sansa is too clever and Arya is too loyal to be so...contrary. Even if they didn't like you or trust you. To go against their best interests, it didn't add up."

This was all so strange to her. The woman who had birth dragons and fought against a dead ice man.

"But I understood everything after Rhaegal died."

"Rhaegal?"

"Aye. Why not Drogon? Why not kill Drogon while you were flying him? You were just near Rhaegal. It would have made perfect sense if the goal was for Cersei to win the war. Because they wasn't the goal. I had bonded with Rhaegal. The only person who he couldn't control. The only person who could help you stop the slaughter in King's Landing and rule with you. Just one more hurdle he'd have to cross. One more unknown in his way. He needed you to fall from grace so that he could rise."

"But what does it matter now if he has control?"

"Look around you." She hadn't even noticed that the sun had begun to peak over the horizon. Subtle pink and orange rays were splayed across the land, before illuminating the bright red leaves and the white bark of a weirwood tree just beside them. The snow melt creating a waterfall over the entrance to the cave she'd been reborn in.

"We're in the north?"

"Not just north. North of the wall. That," he pointed to the cave behind her, "is where Bran was remade into the Three Eyed Raven. And that," he pointed to the weirwood tree, "is where the Night King was created. Their power is connected. It's always been."

"But there is no Night King." As soon as she spoke the words she knew what he meant to do. "You can't."

"No. Ican't, Dany. But we can." He looked at her earnestly. Pleading with her to understand. "This is our duty. I wish I didn't have to ask it of you. But I'm asking you. Fight with me.

She didn't have the words to say. What could she say. He was asking her to become and other. He took her life and now he's asking to live as long as it takes to defeat the Three Eyed Raven.

"How do you know it'd work?" Her eyes searching his for assurance.

"It will, Your Grace." The silken voice threaded a shiver down her spine. The woman, an obvious red priestess by the look of her vibrant burgundy robes and dyed furs.

She turned back to Jon. But before the question could escape her, the woman continued on. "I am Kinvara, Your Grace, and I live to serve the Lord of Light and follow His will. There must always be balance in the world and you both are bound to bring balance back to this world." The woman's gaze was heavy and sure. "He allowed me to bring you back for this purpose. You, Daenerys Stormborn, hold the key to the future. The key to life itself." She looked down at her hands as they moved to cover her womb. She glanced up to see a tear falling from Jon's eye. Warmth blossoming within her she took his hand and placed his palm under the furs covering her. His face melting as he felt the swell that was their child.

"Will it hurt? Will it hurt our child, I mean?" He asked, never moving his eyes from Dany's.

"No, Your Grace. But, really, none of you will be human again. None of you will experience this world how you know it now. You will have a duty. But you will still be a family. And shewill grow. She willbe your daughter. And she will not be your last."

"The people won't see us as their liberators, but as their enemy." She didn't want this to be true but she knew firsthand what they'd be up against.

"History is written by the victors," the woman said bowing in deference. "But the future is written by the free."

She expelled a deep breath. She looked at the man before her once more. The man who'd given her as much as he had taken. A life for a life. She would be his forever, and he, hers. She cradled his face in her hands and drew him near. Her eyes shut softly wanting to remember this moment: the feel of his nose caressing hers, the heat of his breath warming her cool cheeks, his northern smell. If she had to live forever, she would always choose to live forever with him. Her lips melted into his as he pulled at her furs to get her nearer. She felt his hand sink into her hair and their tongues came together. A low moan ripples through her chest as he gripped her waist. It could have been a minute or a year before they broke apart rosy cheeked and out of breath.

Kinvara had retreated to the weirwood tree, sometime during their intimate moment, to set up the braziers and the dragonglass for the ceremony.

Approaching the weirwood tree, he turned her to him one last time and gave her a chaste kiss upon her lips. "I have always loved you, Daenerys, in every way a man can love a woman. I wish there could have been another way. Gods know I don't want this for you, or for our child. But I swear to you, there's no power strong enough in this world that will take you away from me. Not as long as there is air in my lungs. I will fight with you and for you. You will always be my queen. And you will always be my love." He trembled like a leaf before her. She'd never seen him so afraid. She would be strong for him. They would be strong for each other.

"And I love you, my king. We will fight together. For our future."

They knelt before the weirwood and repeated the words. The dragonglass was placed between their hearts and when the king and queen arose, a new dawn rose with them.


End file.
